


Harbor

by Seasonal



Category: AI: The Somnium Files (Video Game)
Genre: Aiba is the best, Date becomes a Dote, Gen, Give Mizuki a hug, Help Date Kaname navigate the perils of sick children, Pre-Canon, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2020-08-07
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:14:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25757923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Seasonal/pseuds/Seasonal
Summary: Date encounters his toughest challenge yet: nursing a sick little girl back to health. On the budding importance of found family.
Relationships: Date Kaname & Okiura Mizuki
Comments: 13
Kudos: 60





	Harbor

**Author's Note:**

> This is my piece for an AI: The Somnium Files zine I was honored to get to write for! No actual spoilers beyond Mizuki's relationship with her parents, as this takes place before the game's events, not long after Date becomes Mizuki's guardian.

Mizuki is two months into being eleven when Date reaches the uncomfortable and, if he has to choose a word for it, _unnerving_ conclusion that his charge can face problems other than her fellow little shits, schoolwork that she never needs any help with, and a heartbreaking sense of abandonment and loneliness accompanying the concern that perhaps she was never good enough for her parents.

(She, of course, has never informed him of the latter part and he doubts she’ll ever open up enough to him to hear it directly from her, but she still shakily whispers apologies in her sleep and gets tear stains on the pillow that he pretends not to notice.)

It’s Aiba who realizes this new problem first, which could be more irritating than it is when it’s a 72% chance that she’ll gloat about how her observation abilities are vastly superior to his-- but the tone of her voice when she urges Date to run a thermal scan on Mizuki grants no room for argument or even dry sarcasm. His partner sounds troubled in her insistence, and it’s why Date (for once) immediately obeys her instructions and activates the ability.

For a moment, it still doesn’t occur to him _why_ , not when he’s only used it to detect a suspect attempting to hide themselves under the cover of darkness, or to confirm that a witness or the subject of an interrogation is lying and will require a Psync session. Mizuki will only be a murder suspect if she catches him nabbing her pudding from the fridge, and he can’t honestly say that Boss would convict her. But right now, Mizuki doesn’t look like she’s entertaining homicidal tendencies. She’s sitting listlessly on the couch, chin lowered towards her chest, and she’s so red and orange that Date nearly yelps from the shock of it.

“Mizuki appears to be suffering from a fever,” Aiba notes, and if the heat that greets Date’s palm isn’t indication enough of her conclusion, the fact that Mizuki doesn’t immediately kick him in the face for slapping his hand to her forehead confirms it beyond a doubt.

She does, however, grace him with a glare that brings him back to so many nights ago with cabaret girls and a wine bottle worth half a year’s salary broken over his head and-- well, it’s not really worth reminiscing over. Not right now, not when Date has to have Aiba relay Mizuki’s exact temperature to him and his eyebrows shoot straight up when she reports back to him with seconds.

Mizuki’s glare falters into startled uncertainty when Date swiftly sinks into a half-crouch before her and seizes her shoulders. “Mizuki,” he utters, his voice a careful mixture of solemnity and dismay. “I didn’t establish this rule clearly enough when you came to live with me, but I need you to listen to me very carefully. Between the two of us… the only one allowed to be alarmingly hot is _me._ ”

“… Disgusting,” his charge says plainly, which is both hurtful and a relief that she’s not sick enough to stop being a brat.

“Disgusting,” Aiba says at exactly the same time, and Date bites his tongue in his attempt to not tell his partner to shut the hell up. Outwardly.

“Stop smearing your germs all over the couch,” he says instead, and hoists Mizuki off the couch, tossing her unceremoniously onto the bed. “I’m going to make a few calls, so get under the covers and go to sleep knowing you’ve got the most amazing person looking after you.”

“I don’t see anyone like that here.” Mizuki’s clearly wilting from her fever, but of course she still has the energy needed for pointless things like insults. And, apparently, worry-- because she lunges to grab the back of his coat as he turns, almost wobbling right off the bed. “And you better not tell Mom or Daddy! I don’t care if you tell the school or whatever, just-- not them. Okay??”

Date turns back to stare at her, a little incredulously. Sure, he doesn’t think Shoko deserves to know anything after what she’s put her kid through, but Renju still at least tries to… well. He tries to _try_.

But Mizuki stares back at him defiantly, face flushed and lips pressed so tightly together in a frown that he thinks they’ll be bruised tomorrow. Worse than her stubbornness, there’s a tell-tale wetness to her eyes, and Date still doesn’t know how to deal with Mizuki crying, except to punch whoever did it. Not applicable in this case, he knows.

But he entertains the thought, just briefly, of letting her parents know. He thinks of Shoko, soft and concerned and full of motherly advice, like does he _really_ know what food Mizuki likes best when she’s feeling queasy. He thinks of Renju, dropping everything to check up on his daughter, to ask for hourly updates, to ruffle her hair and tell her that he’s here for her.

And Date sighs, because he knows that if any of that were possible, he wouldn’t be taking care of Mizuki in the first place. “Fine. I pinky promise, I’ll swallow needles, stab me in the eye if I lie, specifically the left one.”

“Rude,” Aiba protests, but Mizuki is mollified enough to shuffle under the covers and that’s a good start. Surely the actual nursing her back to health will be so simple that he _won’t_ need to ask his partner for help.

… He doesn’t end up asking his partner for help. Not until he’s asked Mama, Pewter, and Boss first, and the answer from two out of three has been a very flat “Don’t you have an incredibly competent AI in your eye socket for times like these, you hopeless idiot?”

Aiba, in true infuriating fashion, smugly recites a list of remedies and fever-reducing medicine that she doesn’t bother to dumb down for him (just so she can _also_ label him a hopeless idiot when Date has to snap out that “acetylsalicyclic acid” sounds like a shitty thing to give a kid).

“I hate you so much,” Date grouses, and it’s only when Mizuki exhales miserably underneath her blanket cave that Aiba relents and becomes incrementally more helpful.

He can’t go running off to the store and just leave her unattended, even if he knows she’d insist she could take care of herself-- and more than half the time, Mizuki is absolutely right. But leaving her to fend for herself doesn’t make him any better than her parents, so Date doesn’t allow the thought to linger for longer than five seconds before he’s perusing the medicine cabinet and the fridge to see what they already have.

It’s not great. Aspirin he’s got, for all of those times spent at Marble, which is better than nothing, but the fridge doesn’t have much in the way of nutrients. At least he’s got tap water so Mizuki can stay hydrated, a damp washcloth instead of a cooling gel pad for her forehead, and enough rice to try for okayu. And Mizuki’s own pudding, for bribery.

“How in the world did you manage to get through your own sicknesses?” Aiba inquires, rather incredulously as Date dumps the rice into the pot and begins pouring in water. “You’re not exactly well-stocked here.”

“I was amazing with a flawless immune system, obviously,” Date retorts, and it’s not like he has the memory to know whether that’s an outright lie or not. “And it’s fine, we can call Boss to bring some better meds after I make sure Mizuki eats something. If she’s that sick, she won’t care too much about how this tastes anyway. Besides, I think we’ve still got a few instant ramen packets we could dump in--”

“Don’t you _dare._ ”

He doesn’t dare, though he _does_ come close. It’s a bland dish Date presents a groggy Mizuki with and of course she has the presence of mind to tell him that it tastes like low effort crap even as he has to rest one hand at her back to keep her propped up long enough to eat half the bowl.

Boss has to let herself in with sports drinks, cooling pads, and kid-friendly medicine after Date fails to answer the door-- and as she places the bag in the one free spot on the cluttered kitchen counter, her eyebrows arch.

“Shut up,” Date growls automatically from his spot on the edge of the bed, Mizuki’s head cushioned on his thigh as though she’d just slumped there (she had) and he hadn’t been able to move for fear of waking her (also true). “The more she sleeps, the faster she’s over it and then I don’t have to play Nurse again.”

“Sure,” Boss says blithely, even though all of them know that she’d walked in just in time to see Date tentatively resting his hand on his charge’s hair, soothing her.

Mizuki’s fever breaks during the night, but Date sits with her even longer and swears his already-secret AI to further secrecy on the subject.


End file.
